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63-628: Many people have made use of, or invented , units of measurement intended primarily for their humor value. This is a list of such units invented by sources that are notable for reasons other than having made the unit itself, and that are widely known in the Anglophone world for their humor value . Most countries use the International System of Units ( SI ). In contrast, the furlong / firkin / fortnight system of units of measurement draws attention by being extremely old fashioned and off-beat at

126-497: A protologism is such a term used exclusively within a small group; a prelogism is such a term that is gaining usage but still not mainstream; and a neologism has become accepted or recognized by social institutions. Neologisms are often driven by changes in culture and technology. Popular examples of neologisms can be found in science , technology , fiction (notably science fiction ), films and television, commercial branding, literature , jargon , cant , linguistics ,

189-399: A mile (1  km ). Liquid volume is measured in gloops, and temperature in degrees Q (57 °Q is said to be the freezing point of water). In issue 33, Mad published a partial table of the " Potrzebie System of Weights and Measures" developed by 19-year-old Donald E. Knuth , later a famed computer scientist . According to Knuth, the basis of this new revolutionary system is

252-460: A very-large-scale integration (VLSI) chip equal to 0.00627264 sq in (4.0468564224 mm) or the area of a square of side length 0.0792 in (2.01168 mm). VLSI nanoacres have similar total costs to acres in Silicon Valley . This unit is similar in concept to the attoparsec, combining very large and small scales. When a barn (a very small unit of area used for measuring

315-517: A 2015 interview that the Curiosity rover team at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory uses the similar unit 'watt-hours per sol' in their meetings, and the team told Weir that they should just call them milli-pirate-ninjas. The Friedman is approximately six months, specifically six months in the future, and named after columnist Thomas Friedman who repeatedly used the span in reference to when

378-469: A WAM for Wiffle (ball) assisted measurement, is equal to a sphere 89 millimetres (3.5 inches) in diameter – the size of a Wiffle ball , a perforated, light-weight plastic ball frequently used by marine biologists as a size reference in photos to measure corals and other objects. The spherical shape makes it omnidirectional and perfect for taking a speedy measurement, and the open design also allows it to avoid being crushed by water pressure. Wiffle balls are

441-478: A book they start. Invented by mathematician Jordan Ellenberg , books with a lower HI are less likely to be completed. It is named after Stephen Hawking , whose book A Brief History of Time scores 6.6% on the scale. Helen of Troy (from the Iliad ) is widely known as "the face that launched a thousand ships". Thus, 1 millihelen is the amount of beauty needed to launch a single ship. Other derived units such as

504-399: A determination of Iraq's future could be surmised. A jiffy is a unit of time used in computer operating systems, being the interval of time between system timer interrupts. This interval varies from system to system, but is typically between 1 and 10 milliseconds. According to Gian-Carlo Rota , the mathematician John von Neumann used the term microcentury to denote the maximum length of

567-511: A given computer mouse pointing device. It is named after Walt Disney's Mickey Mouse cartoon character. Mouse motion is reported in horizontal and vertical mickeys. Device sensitivity is usually specified in mickeys per inch. Typical resolution is 500 mickeys per inch (16 mickeys per mm), but resolutions up to 16,000 mickeys per inch (600 mickeys per mm) are available. A Muggeseggele is a humorous Alemannic German idiom used in Swabia to designate

630-409: A humorous tribute to Carl Sagan and his association with the catchphrase "billions and billions", a sagan has been defined as a large quantity – technically at least four billion (two billion plus two billion) – of anything. Parsecs are used in astronomy to measure interstellar distances. A parsec is approximately 3.26 light-years or about 3.086×10 m (1.917×10  mi ). Combining it with

693-435: A lecture. One microcentury is 52 minutes and 35.7 seconds ‍ —    one millionth of a century. A unit sometimes used in computing, the term is believed to have been coined by IBM in 1969 from the design objective "never to let the user wait more than a few nanocenturies for a response". A nanocentury is one-billionth of a century or approximately 3.156 seconds. Tom Duff is cited as saying that, to within half

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756-583: A misguided romantic quest like that of the title character in Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes ; Scrooge , a pejorative for misers based on the avaricious main character in Charles Dickens ' A Christmas Carol ; and Pollyanna , referring to people who are unfailingly optimistic like the title character of Eleanor H. Porter's Pollyanna . Neologisms are often introduced in technical writing, so-called Fachtexte or 'technical texts' through

819-451: A much cheaper alternative to using two reference lasers, which often pass straight through gaps in thin corals. A scientist on the research vessel EV  Nautilus is credited with pioneering the technique. A barn is a serious metric unit of area used by nuclear physicists to quantify the scattering or absorption cross-section of very small particles, such as atomic nuclei. One barn is equal to 1.0 × 10 m . The name derives from

882-488: A nonspecific very small length or amount of something; it refers to a housefly 's scrotum . A measure of distance equal to about 7 ⁄ 8 of a mile (1.4  km ), defined as the closest distance at which sheep remain picturesque. The Sheppey is the creation of Douglas Adams and John Lloyd , included in The Meaning of Liff , their dictionary of putative meanings for words that are actually just place names. It

945-475: A percent, a nanocentury is π seconds. The New York second ("the shortest unit of time in the multiverse") is defined in Terry Pratchett 's novel Lords and Ladies as the period of time between the traffic lights turning green and the cab behind one honking. The idiomatic expression "in a New York minute ", used in various contexts to mean an instant or a very short time, is of similar origin, referring to

1008-522: A person may replace a word with a nonsensical one of their own invention (e.g., "I got so angry I picked up a dish and threw it at the gelsinger"). The use of neologisms may also be due to aphasia acquired after brain damage resulting from a stroke or head injury . Nanometre The nanometre (international spelling as used by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures ; SI symbol: nm ), or nanometer ( American spelling ),

1071-424: A person's idiolect , one's unique patterns of vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation. Neologisms are usually introduced when it is found that a specific notion is lacking a term, or when the existing vocabulary lacks detail, or when a speaker is unaware of the existing vocabulary. The law, governmental bodies, and technology have a relatively high frequency of acquiring neologisms. Another trigger that motivates

1134-442: A quality or attribute of a perceived object, as opposed to its essence. In physics, new terms were introduced sometimes via nonce formation (e.g., Murray Gell-Man 's quark , taken from James Joyce ) or through derivation (e.g. John von Neumann's kiloton , coined by combining the common prefix kilo- 'thousand' with the noun ton ). Neologisms therefore are a vital component of scientific jargon or termini technici . Polari

1197-447: A scale of nanometres (see nanoscopic scale ). The nanometre is often used to express dimensions on an atomic scale: the diameter of a helium atom, for example, is about 0.06 nm, and that of a ribosome is about 20 nm. The nanometre is also commonly used to specify the wavelength of electromagnetic radiation near the visible part of the spectrum : visible light ranges from around 400 to 700 nm. The ångström , which

1260-405: A six-pack of Genesee beer to wait out an upcoming snowstorm. The index is measured in cans of beer, with roughly one can for every 4 inches (10 cm) of expected snowfall (the index is not perfectly linear at its lower levels as originally introduced); thus, Griffin's six-pack would be recommended for a storm bringing two feet of snow. One mickey is the smallest resolvable unit of distance by

1323-506: A term still below the threshold of a neologism according to Merriam-Webster , is an example of the latter which has specifically spread primarily through Facebook group and Twitter account use. The suspected origin of this way of referring to dogs stems from a Facebook group founded in 2008 and gaining popularity in 2014 in Australia. In Australian English it is common to use diminutives , often ending in –o, which could be where doggo-lingo

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1386-606: A type of dairy product ) from James Joyce 's Finnegans Wake . The title of a book may become a neologism, for instance, Catch-22 (from the title of Joseph Heller 's novel). Alternatively, the author's name may give rise to the neologism, although the term is sometimes based on only one work of that author. This includes such words as " Orwellian " (from George Orwell , referring to his dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four ) and "Kafkaesque" (from Franz Kafka ). Names of famous characters are another source of literary neologisms. Some examples include: Quixotic , referring to

1449-408: A unit of a dirac which was one word per hour. The Garn is a unit used by NASA to measure nausea and travel sickness caused by space adaptation syndrome . It is named after astronaut Jake Garn , who was frequently sick during tests and on orbit. A score of one Garn means the sufferer is completely incapacitated. The Hawking Index (HI) is a unit given as a percentage, of how many people will finish

1512-534: A very small distance, as in "he missed crashing into the truck by a bee’s dick". It is derived from the presumed small size of a male bee's penis. Television station WKBW-TV in Buffalo, New York developed the "Jimmy Griffin Snow Index" to measure the potential severity of a snowstorm. It is named after former Buffalo mayor James D. Griffin , who in 1985 earned the nickname "Six Pack Jimmy" after suggesting residents grab

1575-615: Is ⁠ 1 / 1000 ⁠ of a micrometer . It was often denoted by the symbol mμ or, more rarely, as μμ (however, μμ should refer to a millionth of a micron). The name combines the SI prefix nano- (from the Ancient Greek νάνος , nanos , "dwarf") with the parent unit name metre (from Greek μέτρον , [metrοn] Error: {{Lang}}: Non-latn text/Latn script subtag mismatch ( help ) , "unit of measurement"). Nanotechnologies are based on physical processes which occur on

1638-483: Is interdisciplinary . Anyone such as a lexicographer or an etymologist might study neologisms, how their uses span the scope of human expression, and how, due to science and technology, they spread more rapidly than ever before in the present times. The term neologism has a broader meaning which also includes "a word which has gained a new meaning". Sometimes, the latter process is called semantic shifting , or semantic extension . Neologisms are distinct from

1701-439: Is a unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), equal to one billionth ( short scale ) of a meter (0.000000001 m) and to 1000  picometres . One nanometre can be expressed in scientific notation as 1 × 10  m and as ⁠ 1 / 1 000 000 000 ⁠  m. The nanometre was formerly known as the " millimicrometre " – or, more commonly, the " millimicron " for short – since it

1764-413: Is a blend of the words "breakfast" and "lunch", or through abbreviation or acronym , by intentionally rhyming with existing words or simply through playing with sounds. A relatively rare form of neologism is when proper names are used as words (e.g., boycott , from Charles Boycott ), including guy , dick , Chad , and Karen . Neologisms can become popular through memetics , through mass media ,

1827-497: Is a cant used by some actors, circus performers, and the gay subculture to communicate without outsiders understanding. Some Polari terms have crossed over into mainstream slang, in part through their usage in pop song lyrics and other works. Example include: acdc , barney , blag , butch , camp , khazi , cottaging , hoofer , mince , ogle , scarper , slap , strides , tod , [rough] trade ( rough trade ). Verlan ( French pronunciation: [vɛʁlɑ̃] ), ( verlan

1890-505: Is crucial in various industries and legal systems. Inaccurate translations can lead to 'translation asymmetry' or misunderstandings and miscommunication. Many technical glossaries of English translations exist to combat this issue in the medical, judicial, and technological fields. In psychiatry and neuroscience , the term neologism is used to describe words that have meaning only to the person who uses them, independent of their common meaning. This can be seen in schizophrenia , where

1953-505: Is equal to 0.1 nm, was formerly used for these purposes. Since the late 1980s, in usages such as the 32 nm and the 22 nm semiconductor node , it has also been used to describe typical feature sizes in successive generations of the ITRS Roadmap for miniaturized semiconductor device fabrication in the semiconductor industry . The CJK Compatibility block in Unicode has

List of humorous units of measurement - Misplaced Pages Continue

2016-713: Is named after the Isle of Sheppey in the UK. The Smoot is a unit of length, defined as the height in 1958 of Oliver R. Smoot , who later became the chairman of the American National Standards Institute ( ANSI ), and then the president of the International Organization for Standardization ( ISO ). The unit is used to measure the length of the Harvard Bridge . Canonically, and originally, in 1958 when Smoot

2079-410: Is named after the length of White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci 's tenure under President Trump. In nuclear physics, a shake is 10 nanoseconds, the approximate time for a generation within a nuclear chain reaction. The term comes from the expression "two shakes of a lamb's tail", meaning quickly. A tatum is the "lowest regular pulse train that a listener intuitively infers from

2142-548: Is proposed as an SI unit to replace the old "Crackpot Index" that was presented in 1998. Quack words include 'energy', 'holistic', 'vibrations', 'magnetic healing', 'quantum'. These words are usually borrowed from physics and used to promote dubious health claims. The scale is from 0 to 10, with 0 being 'no quackery' and 10 being 'complete quackery'. Physicist Paul Dirac was known among his colleagues for his precise yet taciturn nature. His colleagues in Cambridge jokingly defined

2205-448: Is seldom used, as it is understood to be too large for normal conversation; its most common form is the microLenat. The Lovelace (Ll) is the unit of the lack of quality of an operating system , i.e., a measure of system administrators ' opinions about how badly the system "sucks". The unit has been coined by members of the system administrator profession who hold a basic tenet that "software that does not suck does not exist". According to

2268-492: Is the predominant language for published research and studies, like-sounding translations (referred to as 'naturalization') are sometimes used. Alternatively, the English word is used along with a brief explanation of meaning. The four translation methods are emphasized in order to translate neologisms: transliteration , transcription , the use of analogues, and loan translation . When translating from English to other languages,

2331-481: Is the reverse of the expression "l'envers") is a type of argot in the French language , featuring inversion of syllables in a word, and is common in slang and youth language. It rests on a long French tradition of transposing syllables of individual words to create slang words. Some verlan words, such as meuf ("femme", which means "woman" roughly backwards), have become so commonplace that they have been included in

2394-431: Is unusual for a word to gain popularity if it does not clearly resemble other words. The term neologism is first attested in English in 1772, borrowed from French néologisme (1734). The French word derives from Greek νέο- néo (="new") and λόγος / lógos , meaning "speech, utterance". In an academic sense, there is no professional neologist, because the study of such things (cultural or ethnic vernacular, for example)

2457-486: The Petit Larousse . Like any slang, the purpose of verlan is to create a somewhat secret language that only its speakers can understand. Words becoming mainstream is counterproductive. As a result, such newly common words are re-verlanised: reversed a second time. The common meuf became feumeu . Neologism development may be spurred, or at least spread, by popular culture. Examples of pop-culture neologisms include

2520-526: The Zork series of games, the Great Underground Empire has its own system of measurements, the most frequently referenced of which is the bloit. Defined as the distance the king's favorite pet can run in one hour (spoofing a popular legend about the history of the foot ), the length of the bloit varies dramatically, but the one canonical conversion to real-world units puts it at approximately two-thirds of

2583-498: The Hubble constant and the speed of light . This amounts to around 13.1 litres (3.46 US gallons , 2.88 Imperial gallons ). This facetious engineering unit is defined as 250 watts  – about a third of a horsepower . A pirate-ninja is defined as one kilowatt-hour (3.6 MJ ) per Martian day, or sol . It is equivalent to approximately 40.55 watts. It is used in the 2011 novel The Martian by Andy Weir . Weir said in

List of humorous units of measurement - Misplaced Pages Continue

2646-453: The Internet , and word of mouth , including academic discourse in many fields renowned for their use of distinctive jargon , and often become accepted parts of the language. Other times, they disappear from common use just as readily as they appeared. Whether a neologism continues as part of the language depends on many factors, probably the most important of which is acceptance by the public. It

2709-578: The Usenet alt.sysadmin.recovery FAQ, one Lovelace is considered a rather large quantity. SI prefixes are commonly used to denote practical quantities. A MegaFonzie is a fictional unit of measurement of an object's coolness invented by Professor Farnsworth in the 2003 Futurama episode " Bender Should Not Be Allowed on TV ". A 'Fonzie' is about the amount of coolness inherent in the Happy Days character Fonzie . During World War II , scientists working for

2772-618: The visual arts , and popular culture. Examples of words that were 20th-century neologisms include laser (1960), an acronym of light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation ; robot (1921) from Czech writer Karel Čapek 's play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) ; and agitprop (1930; a portmanteau of Russian "agitatsiya" (agitation) and "propaganda"). Neologisms are often formed by combining existing words (see compound noun and adjective ) or by giving words new and unique suffixes or prefixes . Neologisms can also be formed by blending words, for example, "brunch"

2835-579: The " atto- " prefix (×10) yields attoparsec (apc), a conveniently human-scaled unit of about 3.086 centimetres (1.215 in) that is used only humorously. The beard-second is a unit of length inspired by the light-year , but applicable to extremely short distances such as those in integrated circuits . It is the length an average beard grows in one second . Kemp Bennett Kolb defines the distance as exactly 100  angstroms (10  nanometres ), as does Nordling and Österman's Physics Handbook . Google Calculator uses 5 nm. An Australian term for

2898-671: The "Date" system in Knuth's article, which substitutes a 10-clarke " mingo " for a month and a 100-clarke "cowznofski", for a year, the date of October 29, 2007 is rendered as "Cal 7, 201 C. M." (for Cowznofsko Madi, or "in the Cowznofski of our MAD"). The dates are calculated from October 1, 1952, the date MAD was first published. Dates before this point are referred to (perhaps tongue-in-cheek) as "B.M." ("Before MAD.") The ten "Mingoes" are: Tales (Tal.) Calculated (Cal.) To (To) Drive (Dri.) You (You) Humor (Hum.) In (In) A (A) Jugular (Jug.) Vein (Vei.) As

2961-746: The American alt-Right (2010s), the Canadian portmanteau " Snowmageddon " (2009), the Russian parody " Monstration " ( c.  2004 ), Santorum ( c.  2003 ). Neologisms spread mainly through their exposure in mass media . The genericizing of brand names , such as "coke" for Coca-Cola , "kleenex" for Kleenex facial tissue, and "xerox" for Xerox photocopying , all spread through their popular use being enhanced by mass media. However, in some limited cases, words break out of their original communities and spread through social media . " DoggoLingo ",

3024-506: The British Department of Miscellaneous Weapons Development encountered a particularly obstructive Royal Navy officer called Commander Pouter, for whom the unit of Obstruction was named, due to his implacable opposition to any work being carried out in the field for which he was personally responsible. Subsequently, the micropouter was used, as it was hoped that no individual of a similarly difficult disposition would be encountered, and

3087-484: The Computer Revolution , Levy mentions how Richard Greenblatt prioritized his work over bathing, leading to a strong stench. Therefore, Greenblatt's coworkers conceived of the blatt as a joke, though the milliblatt was used more, as the blatt was so powerful it was "just about inconceivable". The canard is a unit of quackery created by Andy Lewis in the need for a fractional index measuring pseudoscience . It

3150-424: The busyness of New York and impatience of its residents. An "ohnosecond" is the second after one makes a terrible mistake, such as deleting the wrong file or sending a text message to the wrong person, where the person in question can do nothing but say "oh no". The term is believed to originate from Elizabeth Powell Crowe's 1993 novel, The Electronic Traveler . A Scaramucci (or Mooch) is 11 (sometimes 10) days and

3213-655: The coining of a neologism is to disambiguate a term which may be unclear due to having many meanings. Neologisms may come from a word used in the narrative of fiction such as novels and short stories. Examples include " grok " (to intuitively understand) from the science fiction novel about a Martian entitled Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein ; " McJob " (precarious, poorly-paid employment) from Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture by Douglas Coupland ; " cyberspace " (widespread, interconnected digital technology) from Neuromancer by William Gibson and " quark " (Slavic slang for "rubbish"; German for

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3276-486: The cross sectional area of atomic nuclei ) is multiplied by a megaparsec (a very large unit of length used for measuring the distances between galaxies ), the result is a human-scaled unit of volume approximately equal to 2 ⁄ 3 of a teaspoon (about 3 mL). Similar to the barn-megaparsec, the Hubble-barn uses the barn with the Hubble length , which is the radius of the visible universe as derived by using

3339-402: The folk expressions "As big as a barn," and "Couldn't hit the broad side of a barn", used by particle accelerator physicists to refer to the probability of achieving a collision between particles. For nuclear purposes, 1.0 × 10 m is actually rather large. The outhouse ( 1.0 × 10 barns ) and shed ( 1.0 × 10 barns ) are derived by analogy. The nanoacre is a unit of real estate on

3402-451: The locations of accidents and incidents on the bridge. When the original markings were removed or covered over during bridge maintenance, the police had to request that someone reapply the Smoot scale markings. During a major bridge rebuild, the concrete sidewalk was permanently divided into segments one Smoot in length, as opposed to the regular division of six feet. A wiffle, also referred to as

3465-494: The naturalization method is most often used. The most common way that professional translators translate neologisms is through the Think aloud protocol (TAP), wherein translators find the most appropriate and natural sounding word through speech. As such, translators can use potential translations in sentences and test them with different structures and syntax. Correct translations from English for specific purposes into other languages

3528-455: The negative helen (the power to beach ships) have also been described. The unit of bogosity , i.e. how bogus a person, claim, or proceeding is, derived from the fictional field of Quantum bogodynamics , is the Lenat, named after Douglas Lenat , a computer scientist and professor who failed one of his students on an exam because they answered "AI is bogus" on all of the questions. The Lenat itself

3591-551: The potrzebie, which equals the thickness of Mad issue 26, or 2.263 348 451 743 817 321 6473  mm. Volume was measured in ngogn (equal to 1000 cubic potrzebies), mass in blintz (equal to the mass of 1 ngogn of halva , which is "a form of pie [with] a specific gravity of 3.1416 and a specific heat of .31416"), and time in seven named units (decimal powers of the average earth rotation, equal to 1 " clarke "). The system also features such units as whatmeworry , cowznofski , vreeble , hoo , and hah . According to

3654-418: The pouter was too large a unit for everyday use. Neologism Neologisms are one facet of lexical innovation , i.e., the linguistic process of new terms and meanings entering a language's lexicon . The most precise studies into language change and word formation , in fact, identify the process of a "neological continuum": a nonce word is any single-use term that may or may not grow in popularity;

3717-569: The process of lexical innovation . Technical subjects such as philosophy, sociology, physics, etc. are especially rich in neologisms. In philosophy, as an example, many terms became introduced into languages through processes of translation, e.g., from Ancient Greek to Latin , or from Latin to German or English , and so on. So Plato introduced the Greek term ποιότης ( poiotēs ), which Cicero rendered with Latin qualitas , which subsequently became our notion of ' quality ' in relation to epistemology, e.g.,

3780-405: The same time. One furlong per fortnight is very nearly 1 centimetre per minute (to within 1 part in 400). Besides having the meaning of "any obscure unit", furlongs per fortnight have also served frequently in the classroom as an example on how to reduce a unit's fraction. The speed of light may be expressed as being roughly 1.8 terafurlongs per fortnight (or megafurlongs per microfortnight). In

3843-460: The timing of perceived musical events". It is named after the jazz pianist Art Tatum , who was notable for his high-speed playing. Banana equivalent dose , the amount of radiation exposure gained from eating an average banana. A single BED is considered to be negligibly small, posing no health risk. These units describe dimensions which are not and cannot be covered by the International System of Units. In Steven Levy 's book Hackers: Heroes of

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3906-409: Was a Lambda Chi Alpha pledge at MIT (class of 1962), the bridge was measured to be 364.4 Smoots, plus or minus one ear, using Mr. Smoot himself as a ruler . At the time, Smoot was 5 feet , 7 inches , or 170 cm , tall. Google Earth and Google Calculator include the smoot as a unit of measurement. The Cambridge (Massachusetts) police department adopted the convention of using Smoots to measure

3969-400: Was first used. The term has grown so that Merriam-Webster has acknowledged its use but notes the term needs to be found in published, edited work for a longer period of time before it can be deemed a new word, making it the perfect example of a neologism. Because neologisms originate in one language, translations between languages can be difficult. In the scientific community, where English

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